Pale white line tattoo of a dragonfly with outstretched wings on the upper back of a person with shoulder-length blonde hair, styled in fine line.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Dragonfly outline on upper back

Fine line · Back · Black and grey · Photo

A simple dragonfly outline sits on the upper back, slightly right of the spine, with an oval body and four loop-shaped wings. The thin, even linework is pale cream or white rather than dark ink, and there is no shading or fill. The subject is photographed from behind against a dark background, with the person's blonde hair and a dark strapless top framing the design.

Fine line Back Dragonfly Insect Outline

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Take it to an artist as a reference. A good artist will make it yours rather than copy someone else's tattoo.

A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Sit nearer the stove, all of you, because the 9.40 is late and this tale runs longer than the wait. My grandmother told it to me on the platform at Thornley Junction the winter the pigeons got into the booking hall, and she swore every word was so.

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There was a signalwoman called Edith Parr who kept the crossing gates above the river. Nobody else would take the night shift, for the wind came off the water with fog in its teeth. Edith kept a stub of chalk in her coat pocket and, between trains, she drew on the boards of the signal box to keep her eyes open. Hares. A kettle. And always dragonflies, four loops for wings and a fat bead of a body, drawn so faint you had to lean in with the lamp to see them at all.

One January the fog came in thick as wool, and a coal train ran towards the gates with its lamps dark. Edith swore afterwards that a pale dragonfly came fluttering down the line ahead of the engine, bright as a moth in the lantern light, and that the driver braked for it without knowing why. Nobody was hurt. The driver told the inquiry he had seen a light on the track, and that it had pointed the way to the crossing.

Edith never drew another dragonfly on the boards after that. She drew one on the back of her own hand with a sewing needle and a smudge of soot, so she would always know which way was safe. So when you hear the crossing bell tonight, mind the small light that goes before the train. It's only Edith, keeping the line.